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My exH, when something triggers him, goes into a state sometimes for a few days in which everything said to him just makes things worse.  He becomes verbally abusive, not with insults, just constant blame and giving orders and control.  The only time it ends is when it just gives out - often around 3 days.  SO far it has just been verbal abuse, but we have young children and I always worry that someday he will get them when in this state and do something harsh.  So far, he hasn't, but it's just scary to be near someone who is in this very angry state he can't snap out of.

when my GF has episodes it'll go on for a day or two.  Last time it happened was when I told her I went on my brother's Facebook because he wanted me to see something on his friends page and she flipped out yelling , "why don't you check out all of your EX's too!" and went insane on me for 2 days for no reason.

Yes, it's usually 2-3 days, though can be shorter or longer.

A better word really is (and is being debated?) "emotional regulation disorder". My dBPDbf showed me a graph of normal human emotions. Let's say you can have emotions from 1-10 and in hours 1-72.

The same event can be seen like this:

non emotion: 3pt non time: 3h

pwBPD emotion: 8pt pwBPD time: 12h

If you would get mad at 8 pt on a scale from 1-10, you'd probably not be able to let that cool off in an hour or so, right? Have you ever been supermad at someone? Did anything they try to do in the hour after, make ANY difference to you? Probably not as the emotion was still too high.

Emotions of pwBPD are always very extreme, and therefore their burndown of that feeling/emotion, too.

And if you pay attention usually you can see the emotion building for a day or two prior to the "trigger".  You may hear plenty of sighs, more cursing, rudeness to pets, complaints about t.v. commercials. Then it's something that you have no control over and the full blown rage.  And what they claim to be the "trigger" is never really the "trigger".  Last time for me it was that my mom is a messy eater and will ruin our wedding  .  So here we were, things going fine for a few weeks, then out to breakfast, and suddenly a bunch of things about how she sometimes doesn't want to get married because my mom is a messy eater, she thinks my family will make anti-Semitic remarks to her, won't dress nice for the wedding, and don't care that we are getting married, and that I don't care that we are getting married and am doing nothing to prove my love to her.  And then the subsequent rage because I didn't do enough to validate all that, and instead simply said that there is a lot of anxiety that comes with planning a wedding, and sorry she feels that way about my family, but there is nothing I can do about the way they act or behave.

That was Saturday morning, and as of this morning I can tell she is still in the wind-down mode.  So, in my experience the whole cycle usually lasts a week: 2-3 days of ramping up, then the blow up, and 3-4 days where she is winding down.  After that it's possible to have reasonably calm discussions with her.

Mine after having an episode locks himself in his room and starts drinking heavily. In 2-3 days he's usually done.

I suppose he might be abusive and generally unbearable - if he were sober. But he seems to use alcohol as a way of self-soothing, because he knows that if he makes peoples' life unbearable, it usually does not end well.

Similar happens when we have long-distance fights, but then no-contact lasts longer. For long time I could not understand his feelings in such cases - until finally he revealed he feels angry. It was a real discovery for me - myself, I am quite friendly - and before I met him, I was not able to imagine how one can feel angry for days, so this reason for his silence did not even occur to me.

yep this is my pattern. about 2 days most if the time. sometimes only one. 5 is about the max then there will be a break even if it is only for 12 hours.


that is very interesting way of looking at it. I am reading the essential family guide to BPD and they talk a lot about trying to see things though the pwBPD's eyes. this is great illustration of that.